Santa Clara, California-headquartered SynOptics Communications Inc has started shipping the Lattis System 5000 intelligent hub. Based around a modular architecture, it is said to support more network segments than any other intelligent hub. Each hub can connect up to 52 Ethernet segments, 26 Token Rings or five FDDI rings. The System 5000 employs a new, distributed multiprocessing architecture, built-in with custom ASICs, for its embedded management. Dedicated internal processing hardware and agent software are said to provide management capabilities for multiple networks simultaneously. SynOptics claims that a System 5000 with a typical configuration of management and host modules will have approximately 400 MIPs of processing power for network management functions. Each host module features built-in intelligence, with a dedicated processor to gather critical data on its segment. This data is communicated to management modules over an internal management bus. Each management module features a 33MHz Motorola 68040 processor for storing, manipulating and analysing management data, and has optional Data Collection Engines – multiprocessing daughter boards that can be dedicated to specific network or traffic analysis and problem resolution. A typical configuration for the System 5000 will range from UKP1,300 to UKP4,600 per segment, depending on the number of segments, ports per segment, and the number of Data Collection Engines deployed in the hub. SynOptics also announced a new release of its network management system, Optivity 4.0, featuring an object-based user interface and the ability to view logical networks. Optivity 4.0 for the SunNet manager platform will begin shipping in November and costs UKP6,000. The same functionality will be included in Optivity for IBM’s NetView/6000 and Hewlett-Packard’s open View for Unix, both expected in the first half of 1994.
